White House Tries To Close “Drug War Boondoggle”

By |May 4, 2005

The White House wants to kill the National Drug Intelligence Center in Johnstown, Pa., says U.S. News & World Report. The magazine describes the agency as a “drug war boondoggle.” The pending budget proposal calls for the center’s $40 million annual budget be slashed to $17 million–enough to shut down the unit and transfer its functions. U.S. News says “the facility has run through six directors, been rocked by scandal, and been subjected to persistent criticisms that it should have never been created at all.” Congressman John Murtha, The Pennsylvania Democrat who created the center and had it placed in his district, vows to keep it running.

The Office of Management and Budget says “the proliferation of intelligence centers across the government has not necessarily led to more or better intelligence, but rather more complications in the management of information.” The White House is supporting a new program–the multiagency Drug Intelligence Fusion Center. Blessed by the DEA, the fusion center will be located in the Washington area. It has already received $25 million from Congress in start-up costs and is to open its doors later this year. The idea that a different agency can do the job the NDIC failed to do has left some shaking their heads. “You have to ask, ‘What is the master plan?'” said a former official in the office of the drug czar. “The answer is there is no master plan.”

The legislation marks a major change for Republicans, who long hve embraced a law-and-order rallying cry. Now many GOP senators argue for rehabilitating more offenders rather than long-time incarceration.

An Arizona doctor argues that the government should have learned from previous federal anti-drug strategies that blanket prohibition doesn’t work. He calls for scrapping attempts to curtail opioids and replacing it with “harm reduction” policies.

Expensive medications for inmates can lead to substandard care and delays in treatment, and that may have lasting—even deadly—consequences for incarcerated individuals, writes a prison health care advocate.

Murder rates in the nation’s 30 largest cities are projected to fall by nearly 6 percent this year according to the latest data, undercutting claims that the nation is experiencing a “crime wave,” says the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law.

School safety commission proposes ending a federal guideline telling schools not to punish minorities at higher rates. The panel largely sidestepped issues relating to guns, although it favors arming some school personnel.